completephd coghill
TRANSCRIPT
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
1/390
THE NEO-ARAMAIC DIALECT
OF ALQOSH
BY
ELEANOR COGHILL
CLARE COLLEGE
This thesis is submitted
for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy
Faculty of Oriental Studies
University of Cambridge, September 2003
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
2/390
ii
PREFACE
This dissertation is the result of my own work and includes nothing which is the outcome
of work done in collaboration except where specifically indicated in the text. The research
presented here is based on fieldwork that I have undertaken myself with native speakers of
the Alqoshi dialect.
The text of the dissertation does not exceed the word limit for the Faculty of
Oriental Studies, excluding the extension of 10000 words granted by the Degree
Committee.
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
3/390
iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
My heartfelt thanks go to the many Alqoshis who made this work possible: for giving so
much of their time and support to this project, for welcoming me into their homes and
communities, and for inspiring me with their love for their language. First and foremost I
would like to thank Ghazwan Khundy, my principal informant, who has given up countless
hours of his time over several years to help with this research. He has always received me
with kindness and hospitality and answered my many questions with great patience and
thoughtfulness. Without him my task would have been immeasurably more difficult.
I would also like to thank Safa Tomas who was my main informant before his move
abroad and who gave me my first taste of the Alqosh dialect. My thanks also go to Sa>id
Shamaya, Noah Shikwana, Yosip Bzara and others of the Alqoshi community in Baghdad;
to Younis and Warina Jallu, Khairy Boudagh and Mrs. Boudagh, Najib Risqu and others
from the community in Detroit; and to Hanne Khundy, Mahir, Habbe, and Salim and Nada
Bird->Isa.
I would particularly like to thank my supervisor Geoffrey Khan for the guidance,
encouragement and moral support which he has given me throughout and for always being
readily available to answer questions or give advice.
Thanks are also due to the many people who helped to put in me in contact with my
informants, among them Ali Al-Aamery, Robin Bet-Shmuel, Rev. Emanuel Shaleta,
William Warda and Emmanuel Youkhanna.
I am also very grateful to my parents and my grandfather for their unfailing support
throughout.
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
4/390
iv
Eleanor J. Coghill
SUMMARY
THE NEO-ARAMAIC DIALECT OF ALQOSH
This dissertation is a description of the grammar of a dialect of Neo-Aramaic spoken in the
small northern Iraqi town of Alqosh. Neo-Aramaic is a term applied to the surviving
dialects of Aramaic, a Semitic language spoken in the Near East. The dialect of Alqosh
belongs to the branch of North-eastern Neo-Aramaic (NENA), the largest and most varied
branch of Neo-Aramaic. The speakers of this dialect are part of a Christian minority
belonging to the Chaldean Catholic Church.
The data for this description has been acquired through fieldwork with native
speakers in London, Baghdad and Detroit. The main sources have been (1) oral texts (such
as stories and descriptions) elicited from the speakers, and (2) specific grammatical or
lexical questions designed to complete paradigms or cast light on the meanings and
functions of particular forms.
This dissertation comprises an introduction and chapters on phonology and
morphology, with remarks also on syntax as well as historical and comparative issues. Also
included are oral texts, transcribed from recordings made of native speakers.
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
5/390
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
6/390
vi
1.4.2.5 Velars and uvulars: k,g,x,, q.. 311.4.2.6 Laryngeals and pharyngeals: ,h, , . 311.4.2.7 Emphatics: , , , , , r, , (m), (p), (l) etc. ...33
1.5Assimilation .331.5.1 Voicing assimilation ...341.5.2 Nasal assimilation ...351.5.3 Assimilation to a fricative ..361.5.4 Assimilation of/l/to/r/and/d/ ..361.5.5 Assimilation of the place of articulation .371.5.6 Emphatic spread ..371.5.7 Combinations of assimilatory processes .39
1.6Questions of transcription ....411.6.1 Showing assimilation ..411.6.2 Showing elision ...45
1.7Historical development 451.7.1 Development of the consonants ...45
1.7.1.1 Consonantal change and gemination loss 461.7.1.2 Dissimilation in nouns .471.7.1.3 Analogy in verbal roots ...47
1.7.2 Loss of gemination ..471.7.2.1 In stressed syllables .471.7.2.2 In pretonic syllables .481.7.2.3 In verba tertiae /r/49
1.7.3 Elision of consonants ..491.7.3.1 Loss of//,/h/and/y/before a consonant 491.7.3.2 Elision of//,/h/and/y/after a consonant ...50
2. VOWELS 51
2.1 Phoneme inventory .512.2 Phonology of vowel quality 51
2.2.1 Long vowels 512.2.2 Short vowels 52
2.3 Phonology of vowel length .532.3.1 Distribution of vowel length ...53
2.3.1.1Non-final syllables ...542.3.1.1.1 Closed syllables (-CvCC-) 54
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
7/390
vii
2.3.1.1.2 Open syllables (-CvC-) . 542.3.1.2 Final syllables .. 58
2.3.1.2.1 Closed syllables (-CvC) 592.3.1.2.2 Open syllables (-Cv) . 60
2.3.2 Allophonic relationships between long and short vowels ... 602.3.2.1 Syllable closure 612.3.2.2 Lengthening and shortening due to changes in stress position or word structure
... 63
2.3.2.2.1 Lengthening . 632.3.2.2.2 Shortening 66
2.3.2.3 Discourse lengthening . 692.3.2.4 Notes on the phonology of final unstressed/uC/and/u/. 70
2.4 Phonetic realization .732.4.1 General issues ..73
2.4.1.1Phonetic realization of length ... 732.4.1.2Elision of/e/ ..732.4.1.3Devoicing of final vowels .732.4.1.4Effect of the consonantal environment on vowel quality . 73
2.4.2 Phonetic realization of the vowels .. 742.4.2.1/i/.. 742.4.2.2// . 742.4.2.3// .. 752.4.2.4// .. 752.4.2.5/o/ .. 762.4.2.6// .. 762.4.2.7/e/ .. 762.4.2.8/a/ .. 772.4.2.9/u/ .. 77
2.5 Historical development of vowel phonology ..772.5.1 Contraction of long vowels in syllables that became closed . 772.5.2 Monophthongization ... 782.5.3 Origin of// . 792.5.4 Vowel shortening in final unstressed syllables ... 792.5.5 Contraction of vowels in words that have became particles ... 812.5.6 Reasons for emergence of short vowels in open syllables .. 82
2.5.6.1 Pretonic shortening .. 82
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
8/390
viii
2.5.6.2 Loss of gemination in unstressed syllables ..822.5.6.3 Elision of a consonant ..822.5.6.4 Contraction of//before/h/or/
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
9/390
ix
5. PRONOUNS ... 107
5.1 Independent personal pronouns .. 1075.2 Pronominal suffixes on nouns and particles .. 1095.3 Deictic pronouns . 1125.4 Interrogative pronouns 1165.5 Independent possessive pronouns ... 1185.6 Reflexive pronouns . 1185.7 Reciprocal pronouns ... 1195.8 Indefinite pronouns . 1205.9 Pronouns in combination with the relativizer//d//. 121
6. VERBS 122
6.1 Verbal classes . 1226.2 Inflection of the present base .. 123
6.2.1 Class I verbs 1246.2.2 Class II verbs ... 1256.2.3 Class III verbs . 1256.2.4 Quadriliteral verbs ... 126
6.3 Inflection of the past base ... 1266.3.1 Class II verbs ... 1276.3.2 Class II verbs ... 1286.3.3 Class III verbs . 1286.3.4 Quadriliteral verbs ... 1296.3.5 Phonetic changes caused by the addition of L-set suffixes . 129
6.4 Inflection of the imperative 1306.5 Inflection of the infinitive ... 1306.6 Inflection of the stative participle ... 1316.7 Inflection of the active participle 1326.8 Particles attached to verbal forms ... 135
6.8.1 k-. 1366.8.2 bed-.. 1366.8.3 b-. 1366.8.4 kem-. 1376.8.5 d- 1376.8.6 ud-.. 1376.8.7 d-. 137
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
10/390
x
6.8.8 de-+ imperative .. 1386.8.9 b- + infinitive .. 1386.8.10 -wA.. 1396.8.11 Feminine nominal inflection-Ta. 141
6.9 Negation ..1436.10 Notes on weak verbs .. 143
6.11 Weak verbs in Class I 143
6.11.1 Verba primae/
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
11/390
xi
6.13 Weak verbs in Class III . 156
6.13.1 Verba primae/
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
12/390
xii
6.18.1 Direct objects .. 1726.18.1.1Direct objects on present base forms .. 1726.18.1.2Direct objects on imperatives . 1746.18.1.3Direct objects on past base forms .. 175
6.18.2 Indirect objects 1756.18.2.1Indirect objects on present base forms ... 1766.18.2.2Indirect objects on imperatives .. 1776.18.2.3Indirect objects on past base forms 1776.18.2.4Prepositional indirect objects . 178
6.18.3 Combinations of pronominal suffixes on present base forms and imperative.. 179
6.18.4 Object marking on the infinitive and stative participle .. 1816.19 The B-set series . 181
6.20
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
13/390
xiii
6.28.2.4Development of//in verbal roots ... 1946.28.3 Development of the conjugation classes . 194
6.28.3.1Development of the functions 1946.28.3.2Adaptation of Arabic verbs 195
7. NOUNS ... 196
7.1 Introduction 1967.2 Gender of nouns ..1997.3 Morphology of nouns ending in -a. 203
7.3.1 Bisyllabic patterns .. 2037.3.1.1CvCCa .. 2037.3.1.2Cv@Ca . 2067.3.1.3Cv*Ca . 2117.3.1.4CCv*Ca .. 2127.3.1.5CCv@Ca .. 2127.3.1.6CCvCCa ... 213
7.3.2 Trisyllabic patterns .. 2147.3.2.1CvCvCa 2147.3.2.2CvCCvCa .. 2197.3.2.3CvCvCCa .. 2217.3.2.4CvCCvCCa ... 2227.3.2.5CCvCCvCa 222
7.3.3 Quadrisyllabic patterns ... 2227.3.4 Nouns ending in -iya ... 222
7.4 Nouns ending in -e .. 2237.5 Nouns ending in -u . 2257.6 Nouns ending in -i .. 2257.7 Nouns with feminine//-Ta//inflection ... 226
7.7.1 CvCTa . 2287.7.2 CvTa 2297.7.3 CCvCTa .. 2307.7.4 CCvTa . 2307.7.5 CvCvCTa . 2317.7.6 CvCvTa ....2357.7.7 CvCCvCTa .. 2367.7.8 CvCCvTa . 237
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
14/390
xiv
7.7.9 Other patterns .. 2387.7.10 Nouns ending in -etta . 239
7.8 Derivational suffixes .. 2407.8.1 -ia .. 2407.8.2 -onai. .. 2417.8.3 -na (f. -u -anta -ania) i. .. 2427.8.4 -na ii., -ona ii. 2427.8.5 Pet names and the -u and -e suffixes .. 2437.8.6 -a . 2477.8.7 -ya (mpl. -ye, f. -a, fpl. -aya) ... 2487.8.8 -nya (mpl. -ye,f. -na, fpl. -naya) . 249
7.9 Compounds . 2507.9.1 mar- . 2507.9.2 bar- .. 2517.9.3 Points of the compass .. 2517.9.4 zaqar- .. 2517.9.5 bi- 2527.9.6 Days of the week . 2537.9.7 Borrowed compounds . 2537.9.8 Genitive compounds .. 254
7.10 Nouns ending in a consonant 254
7.11 Plural formation . 255
7.11.1 -e . 2587.11.1.1-a to -e without internal change .. 2587.11.1.2-a to -ewith internal change ... 2607.11.1.3//-Ta//to -e .. 261
7.11.2 -ne . 2627.11.3 -Ce(reduplication of final radical, e.g.para-pare) ... 2647.11.4 -(a)wa .. 264
7.11.4.1-awa 2657.11.4.2-wa .. 265
7.11.5 -a . 2667.11.5.1Singular without//-Ta// .. 2667.11.5.2Singular with//-Ta// .. 268
7.11.6 -ya 2707.11.7 Irregular plurals .. 271
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
15/390
xv
7.11.8 Loan plurals . 2727.11.8.1-at 2727.11.8.2Unadapted loan plurals .. 273
8. ADJECTIVES . 274
8.1 Introduction 2748.2 Adjectives of Aramaic form .. 2758.3 Unadapted loans . 2828.4 Reduplicated expressions .. 2868.5 Comparatives and superlatives .. 2868.6 Negation of adjectives 287
9. NUMERALS .. 288
9.1 Cardinals 2889.1.1 Numerals 1-10 . 2889.1.2 Numerals 11-19 .. 2899.1.3 Tens . 2909.1.4 Hundreds . 2909.1.5 Thousands ... 2919.1.6 Combinations of numerals .. 291
9.2 Ordinals .. 2939.3 Fractions . 2939.4 Frequency .. 2949.5 Counting individuals .. 2949.6 Telling the time .. 2949.7 Approximations .. 294
10. PARTICLES AND ADVERBS . 296
10.1 Introduction ... 296
10.2 Prepositions ... 296
10.2.1 Prefixes and the genitive particle//d// 29710.2.2 Independent and annexing prepositions .. 299
10.3 Adverbs .. 301
10.3.1 Spatial adverbs 30110.3.2 Interrogative adverbs .. 30210.3.3 Adverbs of degree and quantity .. 302
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
16/390
xvi
10.3.4 Temporal adverbs and adverbial expressions . 30310.3.5 Adverbs of manner .. 306
10.4 Conjunctions .. 307
10.4.1 The relative particle 30710.4.2 Conjunctions co-ordinating words and independent clauses .. 30810.4.3 Complementizers 31010.4.4 Conjunctions introducing an adverbial clause 311
10.5 Interjections .. 312
10.6 Miscellaneous particles . 312
10.7 Quantifiers and other non-adjectival modifiers of nouns and pronouns ... 314
APPENDIX .. 318
I Texts .. 318
Informant A . 319
Traditional Houses .. 319
Making Bread and Cheese .. 323
The Game of lwa(extract) .. 327
Clothes 327
A Traditional Doctor .. 329
The Death of As Grandmother .. 331
The Story of the Sparrow with the Splinter in his Foot .. 337
The Story of the Cobbler 339
The Story of the Two Goats ... 345
Informant B. 349
Alqosh . 349
Festivals .. 351
Baptism ... 355
Informant C . 357
Around Alqosh ... 357
Informant D . 359
The Story of the Bad Son ... 359
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
17/390
xvii
II References .. 361
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
18/390
xviii
ABBREVIATIONS AND SYMBOLS
Abbreviations
abbrev. abbreviated (of names)
affect. affectionate (of names)
ANA Alqosh Neo-Aramaic
Arab. Arabic*
Aram. Aramaic
Ard. Aradhin
attrib. attributive
BTA Babylonian Talmudic Aramaic
C consonant
Ch. Christian
cpl. common (gender) plural
cs. common (gender) singular
dim. diminutive
emph. emphatic
Eng. English
f. feminine
fpl. feminine plural
fs. feminine singular
I.A. Iraqi Arabic*
indep. independent
IPA International Phonetic Alphabet
J. Jewish
K. Kurdish (Kurmanji dialect)
lit. literally
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
19/390
xix
m. masculine
mpl. masculine plural
ms. masculine singular
NENA North-eastern Neo-AramaicP. Persian
Pa. Pael (pa>>l)
Pe. Peal (p#>al)
pejor. pejorative
per. person
Perf. Perfect
pl. pluralPN personal name
Qar. Christian Qaraqosh dialect of NENA
Q.A. Q#ltu Arabic (spoken in northern Iraq, southern Turkey and north-eastern Syria)*
sg. singular
Sh. Shaphel (a>l)
Syr. Syriac
T. Turkish
trad. traditional
unv. unvoiced
voi. voiced
v vowel
*N.B. the form of Arabic that has most influenced ANA is Q#ltu Arabic (Q.A.). There is however
little lexical material for this kind of Arabic. As much vocabulary is shared with the better-
documented dialect of Muslim Baghdadi, dictionaries of that dialect have been used when it has not
been possible to find the word in Q#ltu material. In such cases the Arabic word cited is labelled I.A.
(Iraqi Arabic), to indicate that, though only attested in Baghdadi Arabic material, it is not
necessarily restricted to that dialect.
Loanwords from Arabic are marked simply as Arab. (Arabic) unless the word or its
particular form or meaning is only found in the dialects, in which case it is marked as I.A. or Q.A
accordingly. Examples: anafiyatap (Arab.), qubberoom (Q.A.).
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
20/390
xx
Symbols
chapter
< derived from
> developed into
verbal root
~ phonetically conditioned variant (e.g. bed- ~ bet-)
variant not phonetically conditioned (e.g. da
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
21/390
xxi
NOTES ON TRANSCRIPTION
Details of the transcription system used for ANA are outlined in the chapters, especially the
phonological chapters 1-4. Some other transcription methods are also sometimes used,
both for ANA and for other dialects and languages.
(i) Semi-phonetic transcription
Sometimes it is necessary to show detail that phonological transcription omits but not toshow a mass of irrelevant phonetic details. Semi-phonetic transcription is therefore used,
indicated by italics in square brackets. Semi-phonetic transcription shows all emphasis on
consonants, whether phonemic or not, e.g. [bela] bela onion (A). It also shows all
assimilation, e.g. [zya] xzya to see, and final-devoicing, e.g. [mjwep] mjweb
answer! With respect to vowels, it indicates all length, even discourse-lengthening, e.g.
[balqo] b-alqu in Alqosh (o is always long). It does not show elided vowels, e.g.
[qlqle] qle qlehis voice stopped.
(ii) Transcription of other NENA dialects
Examples from other dialects will be transcribed as in the source. Occasionally in brackets
the semi-phonetic transcription (see above) will be given in order to allow comparison with
ANA. In this vowels and consonants will be written as in ANA, for instance Mangesh ima
taste as [ema] and Qaraqosh #
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
22/390
xxii
marked with a dot below, as in ANA, rather than a line underneath (which is used in
Rizgars dictionary (1993) for unaspirated consonants). The points where this system
differs from some others are as follows:
Aspirated consonants are so indicated with an apostrophe after the letter, e.g. k/is written with >, not by underlining the ethat follows it.
The trilled rhotic is indicated by rto distinguish it from the tap r.
Short [] is distinguished from [i:] thus: i .
Short [] is distinguished from [A] thus: e a.
Note also that:
is ANA . is ANA .
cis ANAj. is ANA .
is ANA . ois long, like ANA o.
jis ANA.
his ANA .
xis ANA.
Other letters are pronounced more or less as in ANA.
(iv) Arabic transcription
Classical Arabic is transcribed according to the usual conventions. Baghdadi Arabic is
transcribed as it is in the dictionaries (e.g. Woodhead and Beene 1967) except that vowel-
length is shown with a macron, not doubling of the letter, and the pharyngeals are written
as >and , not with the Arabic letter. Q#ltu Arabic is transcribed as it is in the source it is
taken from (e.g. Jastrow 1978).
Arabic words in the texts are more of a problem, as in some cases they are true
loans integrated into ANA and in other cases they are examples of code-switching. When
they are considered to be the latter, they are marked withA
A. The dividing line between
the two is however difficult to define with any certainty.
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
23/390
xxiii
Arabic words thought to be true loans are written with the normal ANA system, e.g.
qemmasummit (Arab. qimma). Cases of probable code-switching are transcribed as they
sound in the text rather than as they are written in Classical Arabic, e.g.Aptid
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
24/390
1
INTRODUCTION
I The Neo-Aramaic Background
The dialect described here is a North-eastern Neo-Aramaic dialect spoken in the town of
Alqosh in northern Iraq. Neo-Aramaic is a term used for the surviving dialects of
Aramaic spoken in the Near East. The ancient division of Aramaic into Western and
Eastern branches is still preserved, but the vast majority of modern dialects belong to the
Eastern branch. North-eastern Neo-Aramaic is by far the largest subgroup of this and isspoken in the border areas of Iraq, Turkey, Iran and Syria. These are areas where the
majority of inhabitants are Kurds, but Aramaic-speaking Christians form a significant
minority. In the recent past there were also Aramaic-speaking Jewish communities, but
most left during the 1950s for Israel.
All Neo-Aramaic languages and dialects are under threat. Some, especially those
only spoken in exile, are very endangered and in some cases the last remaining speakers
have died in recent times. Those dialects which are still spoken in situ are likely to last
longer, but they too are being eroded, whether by emigration or by the adoption of the
majority languages of the region. Very few speakers are literate in their language,
although some literary varieties exist. The vast majority are educated in the official
languages of their countries. In the case of Iraq, this is Arabic. The young people also
come into contact with majority ethnic groups when they go to work and live in the cities
and this inevitably affects their language. Political upheavals have also taken their toll:
many villages were destroyed in the 1980s during the war between the government and
the Kurds, and people moved to other areas of Iraq or abroad.
Despite the bleak picture, there is still great linguistic diversity within North-
Eastern Neo-Aramaic and a great deal that can be documented. Dialects may be quite
different in villages which are only a few miles away. There are also linguistic divisions
based on communal lines. In some towns, the dialects spoken by Jews and Christians
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
25/390
2
were so different as to make mutual comprehension difficult. In order to preserve this
diversity, grammatical descriptions tend to be rigorous in distinguishing the dialects of
different villages and towns.
II Alqosh
The town of Alqosh is situated in the far north of Iraq, around thirty miles north of
Mosul. It lies at the point where the plain of Mosul touches the mountains of the North.
The inhabitants of Alqosh are Christians belonging to the Chaldean Church which was
formed through the uniting of some communities belonging to the Church of the East
with the Roman Catholic Church. The Chaldeans live mostly in the area around Alqosh:
the Mosul Plain and the mountains to the north and the east. Alqosh itself is animportance religious centre for the Chaldeans. Only two miles away is the historic
monastery of Rabban Hormizd which was once one of the patriarchal residences of the
Church of the East. This has since moved, first to Mosul, then Baghdad, but Alqosh
remains the seat of a bishopric.
The current population of Alqosh is around 5000 but there are many Alqoshis
living outside the village, in Mosul, Baghdad and countries abroad, especially the United
States and Britain. Alqosh is a market town used by the surrounding villages, which are
populated by various ethnic groups including other Chaldeans, Assyrians and Yazidi
Kurds, known as dasnye. The main occupations in Alqosh are agriculture and animal
husbandry. The crops grown include wheat, barley, chickpeas, lentils, beans, cucumbers,
gourds, melons and figs. There are also many vineyards for the production of wine.
Sheep and goats are kept for their milk, meat and wool. In earlier times traditional trades
were practised, such as weaving and dying cloth.
Alqosh is set at the foot of a mountain, known as red-
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
26/390
3
The village itself is divided into quarters, called maallat(sg. maalle). Each has
a name:
maalled-bi-qa(The Quarter of the House of the Priest)
maalled-bisna(originally bi-smaof the Place of Silver)
maallet-tatni(The Quarter Below)
maallet-xiprta(The Quarter of the Digging)
maalled-bi-zla(The Quarter of the Layabout)1or mem-zla
Alqosh is the location of many religious sites.2Most famous is the monastery of Rabban
Hormizd (dred-rabban-hrmez). There is another monastery called dred-plta
(Monastery of the Virgin) but often known as dra xtya(The Lower Monastery) dueto its lower position.
There are three churches in Alqosh:
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
27/390
4
founded a school in the town. Alqosh emerges into the light of history in the seventh
century AD when close to the town a monastery was founded by the Persian saint Rabban
Hormizd.4
Alqosh gained significance through its proximity to the monastery of RabbanHormizd. The patriarchate of the Church of the East took up residence in this monastery
in the aftermath of the devastating invasions of the Mongol ruler Timur Leng in the late
fourteenth century. Permanent residence began in the reign of Shimun VI (1504-1538)
and remained there, with occasional interruptions, until the late eighteenth or early
nineteenth century.5In 1807 it became the home of a Chaldean Catholic monastic order.
The monastery also saw the earliest significant inroads of the Catholic church into
the Church of the East. Around the middle of the 15th
century the patriarchal succession
became restricted to the family of the then patriarch (henceforth known as Abouna or Bar
Mama) and from then on the office passed from uncle to nephew. But in 1551 there was a
dispute over the patriarch and a rival was put forward named Yuannan Sulaqa, an abbot
of Rabban Hormizd and a native of Alqosh. He was sent by his supporters to Rome
where in 1553 he was consecrated as Patriarch of the Chaldeans.
Roman Catholicism nevertheless had not yet established a firm hold on the
region. A century and a half later Sulaqas descendants renounced Catholicism. In the
meantime another uniat patriarch in Diarbakir had been consecrated. This line ended in
1828 and ten years later a member of the Abouna family who had converted was
consecrated patriarch by Rome, but only on condition that the succession would not
remain in his family. It was only in 1844 that the Chaldean Catholics were recognized by
the Ottoman government as a separate millet or religious group.6
4The above information comes from Fiey (1965: 387-389 and, for Nahum, 396-400).
5Murre-van den Berg (1999b).
6 Information on the history of Alqoshs relations with the Church is taken from Murre-van den Berg
(1999a: 33-5), Murre-van den Berg (1999b), Fiey (1965: 390-1), and Joseph (2000: 55-8).
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
28/390
5
IV Alqosh Neo-Aramaic (ANA)
The dialect of Alqosh is closest to other Christian (particularly Chaldean) dialects of the
surrounding area: the Mosul Plain and the mountainous region to the north. The first
descriptions of these in the late 19
th
century and early 20
th
century rarely distinguishedbetween the dialects of the various Chaldean villages but rather treated them as a single
dialect. Guidi (1883), Sachau (1895) and Rhtor (1912) called it Felli, after the Arabic
term for peasant or farmer, the main occupation of the Chaldeans.7 Maclean, in his
grammar (1895) and dictionary (1901) of the Christian NENA dialects, covered the
dialects of the Mosul Plain as one dialect which he termed the Alqosh Dialect.
More recent descriptions distinguish between the dialects of the various villages
and towns and have revealed far more variation than had been recognized by the early
Neo-Aramaicists. The dialects of this group for which there is a description (article or
book) are as follows: Aradhin (Krotkoff 1982), Mangesh (1974, 1990, 1993), Telkepe
(texts only, Sabar 1978, 1993), Telesqof (the verbal system, Rubba 1993), Zakho
(Hoberman 1993, Mole (M.Phil. thesis) 2000) and, most recently, Qaraqosh (Khan 2002).
Alqosh Neo-Aramaic (ANA) is unusual among the NENA dialects in having a
literary tradition. Because of the importance of Alqosh in the Chaldean Church, it was for
centuries a centre of literary activity. It is here that the earliest Christian Neo-Aramaic
literature was written as far back as the 16th century.8The literary dialect therefore shows
a particular resemblance to the dialect of Alqosh itself, but it would be dangerous to rely
on these literary texts alone for information on the dialect. Literary languages are rarely
exact imitations of the vernacular. They tend to draw upon several dialects, as well as
earlier literary languages (in this case Syriac). Moreover the system of orthography can
often obscure the actual pronunciation of the language. It should also be noted that these
texts reflect an earlier stage of the dialect. Research on the modern vernacular can
therefore reveal some of the developments that have occurred in the language over the
last few centuries.
7Texts of Felli were also published in Socin (1882).
8Some of this literature can be found in Poizat (1990, 1993) and Mengozzi (2000a,b).
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
29/390
6
ANA, like other NENA dialects, has been greatly influenced by other regional
languages, in particular Kurdish and Arabic but also Turkish and Persian. This is
particularly evident in the vocabulary, as will be shown in Chapter Seven. These
languages are also of course divided into dialects and it can be seen that the influence isgreatest from the dialects spoken in the area around Alqosh. In the case of Kurdish these
are dialects of Kurmanji. In the case of Arabic they are the Q#ltu dialects, which are
spoken across northern Iraq and the bordering areas of Turkey and Syria.
The main lexical sources used in this thesis for Kurmanji are as follows: the
dictionary by Rizgar (1993) and the glossaries in Blau (1975) and Wurzel (1997). The
main lexical sources for Iraqi Arabic are the Muslim Baghdadi dictionaries Woodhead
and Beene (1967) and Clarity, Stowasser and Wolfe (1964), the glossary of two Jewish
Q#ltu dialects in Jastrow (1990b), and various other works on Q#ltu dialects by Jastrow
(1978, 1979 and 1981).
IV Methodology
Working with endangered languages often involves constraints on methodology, for
instance when it is not possible to gather data from a large pool of people or to work with
the language in its homeland. This is the case with ANA, as it has not yet been possible to
conduct fieldwork in Alqosh itself and it has therefore been necessary to track down
speakers abroad. There is nevertheless good reason to be assured that the informants used
in this study are reliable speakers of the Alqosh dialect (see below).
Two methods of gaining grammatical information have been used. One is to
record the informant speaking on a topic. Such recordings are referred to as texts. They
are not as natural as recordings of spontaneous discourse, but those are harder to obtain
among speakers in exile. Monologues also have some advantages, as they are usually
clearer. In spontaneous conversations speakers tend to interrupt and talk over each other
which can make transcribing a whole text difficult.
The topics suggested to the informant focus on aspects of traditional life which
would be associated with ANA, rather than the parts of their life which they associate
with Arabic or English. Texts about school or the army would probably involve a great
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
30/390
7
deal of Arabic borrowing, as it is Arabic that is used in these situations. Such texts are
valid as part of a description of the language of the younger generation, showing the
increasing influence of Arabic on the language, but when the emphasis is on recording an
endangered language, it becomes a priority to preserve older patterns of speech.The other method of eliciting information is by asking grammatical questions of
the form, How do you say ? This has the disadvantage of being self-conscious and
lacking in context. There is some risk that the speaker will make conscious decisions
about what is grammatically right, rather than simply thinking of what he would say.
The advantages of this method are that it can be used very efficiently to complete
paradigms (which it is rarely possible to complete from texts alone) and to confirm
deductions made on the basis of textual material. It is also necessary to use it with rare
forms or constructions that would seldom occur in the texts. The risks can be minimized
by assessing the usefulness of the speaker for grammatical questions and being aware
when he or she is confused or making a value judgement.
The grammatical descriptions included here are based on the speech of Alqoshis
living in London, Baghdad, Detroit and Alqosh itself. Naturally with exiles there is a risk
that their language has become contaminated by the other languages they use or the other
NENA dialects they come into contact with. Nevertheless there is such a strong similarity
between the idiolects of the different speakers, that it seems very likely that they are all
still speaking more or less the same, Alqoshi, dialect. Fortunately there was also the
opportunity to work, at a late stage in the investigation, with a speaker still residing in
Alqosh (Informant F).
The main informants from whom the data in this study has been drawn are listed
below with some relevant information. Most ages given are approximate.
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
31/390
8
Informant A
Informant A is the main informant used for grammatical or lexical questions. In addition,
many texts were obtained from him. He is a man in his thirties living in London, who left
Alqosh in 1991. He speaks Arabic and English fluently and also speaks some Kurmanji
and Greek. Informant A lived until recently with his brother and is in frequent contact
with others from Alqosh. He is furthermore conscious of the differences between his
dialect and others and is able to indicate them. Texts made of other Alqoshis living in
Baghdad have confirmed that his dialect is typically Alqoshi.
Informant B and C
Informants B and C, also educated men in their early 30s, left Alqosh in the early
nineties and at the time of the recordings in 1999-2000 had been living in London for a
few years.
Informant D
Informant D is an educated man in his late sixties living in Baghdad since he left Alqosh
as a young man. Quotations in this work that are marked (D) are from his collection of
Alqoshi proverbs which he kindly read out to the author.
Informant E
Informant E is a man in his fifties living in Detroit. After leaving Alqosh as a young man
he trained for two or three years to be a priest then left and entered the military where he
remained for three years. Immediately afterwards he came to America and settled there.
Informant F
Informant F is the mother of A, a woman in her mid-fifties. She still lives in Alqosh and
recordings of her speech were made during a visit to London.
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
32/390
9
Informant G
Informant G is a woman in her fifties living with her family in Detroit.
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
33/390
10
CHAPTER ONE
CONSONANTS
1 Consonants1.1 Phoneme inventoryStops /Affricates
Unvoiced p t k q 1
* These sounds are of marginal phonemic status (only phonemic in a few loanwords at most).
** These sounds are of uncertain phonemic status.
1This sound (the Arabic >ayn) is conventionally described as a fricative, the voiced counterpart of//, but is
now thought to be more accurately described as an approximant (cf. 1.4.2.6).
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
34/390
11
1.2 General issuesThe phonology of ANA has undergone quite significant change from that of earlier
dialects of Aramaic. Phonetic developments have occurred, for instance the shift of //to
/x/, and phonemic distinctions have been gained and lost. In addition, the large numbers
of loanwords from Kurdish, Arabic and other languages have introduced new phonemes,
such as/j/and//,or reintroduced ones that had been virtually lost, such as //.
One of the more obvious changes from earlier Aramaic is the breakdown of the
beakeasystem in which members of a set of phonemes, /b/, /g/, /d/, /k/, /p/and /t/,
each had two allophones: plosive and fricative. After vowels the consonant was realized
as a fricative, except when geminated. In all other cases a plosive was found, with some
exceptions. This system has been altered by two processes. In the case of/p/the fricativeallophone has been lost and the plosive allophone generalized to all contexts.2In the case
of /b/, /g/, /d/, /k/ and /t/, the two realizations have been preserved but have been
phonemicized. Thus we find the stop [t] after a vowel in ta year and the fricative []
at the beginning of a word in lashe came, showing that the two sounds are no longer
in complementary distribution. This phonemicization has come about through various
phonetic processes. In most cases it involves the loss of a consonant such that a fricative
allophone occurs in a position previously reserved for a plosive, or vice versa. For
instance la she came derives from *
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
35/390
12
Firstly they are not always available. Phonemic distinctions may be used as the only
marker of distinction between two words, but whether this actually occurs is due to
chance. Sometimes there are no minimal pairs attested for contrasts which seem well
established in the language, for instance between/d/ and/t/. Secondly, a single minimalpair only shows a two-way distinction: in the example above, between a voiceless dental
stop, t,and a voiceless dental fricative, . This minimal pair cannot prove, for instance,
that [t] is not in an allophonic relationship with its voiced counterpart [d]. This would
have to be established with another minimal pair. Listing minimal pairs for every possible
combination of consonants is, however, unfeasible and unnecessary, as phonemic status
can be established beyond reasonable doubt by more targeted research. Knowledge of
common tendencies of phonetic behaviour, the particular phonetic behaviour of the
language and the phonologies of earlier and contemporary relatives can direct one to
check contrasts that might be doubtful and avoid unnecessary investigation into pairs of
consonants that are very unlikely not to be contrasted.
From a cross-linguistic perspective, the sounds that are most likely to be
allophones of each other are those that are identical but for one or two characteristics
(e.g. voicing, aspiration etc.), or are articulated in close proximity to each other. Sounds
that share few if any characteristics are least likely, for example the voiced bilabial stop
[b] and the voiceless alveolar affricate [tS]. Allophones are occasionally phonetically
quite different from each other, like the [/] allophone of /t/ in the London English
pronunciation of water, but such examples are rare and, in the case of Aramaic, would
probably be known from historical evidence. Therefore we concentrate on presenting
phonemic contrasts between consonants that share most of their values, in most cases all
but one, as in the following two pairs:
t- voiceless dentalstopand voiceless dentalfricative
t-d voicelessdental stop and voiceddental stop
Knowledge of general traits in the phonetic behaviour of ANA can also help focus
investigation. For instance in ANA the distinction between voiced and voiceless is
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
36/390
13
frequently neutralized, so it is necessary to establish these contrasts, where they do exist.
The same applies to the emphatic - non-emphatic and nasal - non-nasal distinctions.
The phonologies of earlier dialects can also be of help. Because at an earlier stage
the fricative and plosive realizations of beakea consonants were in complementarydistribution, it is particularly worthwhile to seek phonemic contrasts between the ANA
reflexes of these, e.g. between [d] and [] and [k] and [x], in order to establish whether
this contrast has become phonemicized or not. It is also helpful to compare the phonology
of related contemporary dialects. For instance it is worthwhile establishing phonemic
contrasts between the dental and alveolar fricatives [] and [s], as in some dialects the
distinction has been blurred or lost.3
With this targeted method, many phonemic distinctions do not need to be
confirmed. Sometimes, however, a phonemic distinction does need to be established but
there is no minimal pair available. In such cases phonemic contrast can be shown by
examining the distribution of the sounds. If they are not in a complementary distribution
with each other, then they may be considered to be separate phonemes. This can be
established beyond reasonable doubt by targeting certain conditioning factors. For
instance the factors found to condition voicing are the voicing of the following consonant
(1.5.1) and whether the consonant occurs at the end of a word (when it is voiceless). If
both the voiceless and voiced counterparts of a pair can both be found in positions not
conditioned in these ways, then they may be considered to be separate phonemes, even if
no minimal pair exists. For instance both/t/and/d/may be found in contexts where they
are not affected by the conditioning factors mentioned above, e.g. teka drawstring and
duka place. They may therefore be considered as separate phonemes. Initial, pre-
vocalic position is the position in which there is likely to be the least amount of influence
from surrounding sounds. Therefore if both sounds are regularly found in this position,
they may be considered to be in phonemic contrast.4
3As in Jewish Zakho (cf. 1.3.2). Also, in the dialect of Jilu,/q/is articulated as far forward as/k/before/i/
or//, though/q/is still distinguished by its lack of aspiration (Fox 1997: 8). Historic */q/is also articulated
as unaspirated [k] in the dialect of Urmi (Odisho 1988: 25).4 This test does not apply to emphasis distinctions as emphasis can spread (by assimilation) between
consonants which are separated by a vowel.
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
37/390
14
Even when a minimal pair may be found, this is not necessarily proof of a well-
established phonemic contrast. In fact there are varying degrees of phonemicity. If a
sound is only phonemic in a handful of loanwords, even if it occurs as an allophone in
many other words, the sound may be considered as marginally phonemic. For instance,common as an allophonic variant of //, is only attested as a phoneme in a few Kurdish
loans. Likewise can be explained by conditioning in all but one case, the loanword/,//and//the impact of the loanwords has been reinforced by the
occurrence of these phonemes in a few words of native stock,5as well as their presence in
the liturgical language, Syriac.
Even phonemic contrasts which are well established may be neutralized in certain
environments. Most common is the loss of voicing contrast due to assimilation to a
following consonant. Also prevalent is emphatic spread which neutralizes the emphatic -
non-emphatic contrast. These types of assimilation will be dealt with in 1.5 below. In
this section, for the purpose of establishing contrasts, only the basic allophone of each
phoneme will be given. For instance,/b/is defined as a voiced bilabial stop, even though
in certain contexts it may be voiceless.
5//and//have even developed in native forms where they were not found in earlier Aramaic (cf. 1.3.5-
6).
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
38/390
15
1.3.1 Labials:p,b,f,v,w,mThe fricative allophone of earlier Aramaic */p/has been merged with the stop allophone,
so /p/ is found in all contexts, e.g. poxa air and
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
39/390
16
There is no minimal pair available for the contrast /v/-/f/ but as they usually have
different origins (Kurdish and Arabic respectively) they are unlikely to be allophones. A
near-minimal pair is as follows:
v-f evlaear of grain leflashe wrapped
The nasal bilabial stop/m/contrasts phonemically with/b/in the following minimal pair:
b-m braside mramaster
It also contrasts with the other nasal phoneme/n/:
m-n mrashe said nrariver
1.3.2 Dentals, alveolars and post-alveolars:t, d, , , s,z, ,, n, r, lThe fricative allophone of earlier Aramaic */t/has been preserved in ANA, unlike some
other NENA dialects,8and phonemicized, as in the following minimal pairs:
t- tlafox lashe came
tayear afever
The fricative allophone of earlier Aramaic */d/ has also been preserved, for instance in
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
40/390
17
t-d torabull doraturn (in game)
tekacord dukaplace
-
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
41/390
18
The two liquids, the lateral approximant /l/ and (often lateral) flap /r/,are contrasted in
the following pairs:
l-r blamind braside
bllashe was tried brlait (f.) happened
m-ilewhat is it (m.)? miresaid (pl. stative participle)
The post-alveolar fricative// (IPA [S]) is contrasted with the alveolar fricative /s/in the
following pairs:
s- niansign nisanApril
rqato suck srqato comb
maoyeto stuff masoyeto absolve
1.3.3 Affricates:,jThese phonemes are almost only ever attested in loanwords, mostly from Kurdish and
Arabic, but they are well-established in the language. The following are some examples:
// /j/
rekquarter (K.) jarmy (Arab.)
ytea (K.) jrato be injured (Arab.)
u- any (K.) mjawobeto answer (Arab.)
antabag (K.) msajoleto record (Arab.)
ykato pierce (I.A.) julleclothes (K.)
yqato tear (I.A.) jwanqayouth (K.)
There are a few attested instances of // occuring in Aramaic words as a result of the
merging of /t/and //. The adverbs
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
42/390
19
In Christian Urmi the affricate // is an allophone of /k/ found in non-emphatic
environments.11
In ANA both sounds are found in non-emphatic environments and there
is a minimal pair available to confirm the contrast:
-k akka instrument kakkadaddy, grandad
1.3.4 Palatal:yThe only palatal consonant is the approximant /y/. This is distinguished from the labio-
velar approximant/w/:
y-w
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
43/390
20
Aramaic is preserved in parabody and the verb sato bow down but these are
in fact loans from the liturgical language Syriac and have specialized religious
meanings.12
Many cases of the voiced velar fricative have arisen through voicing assimilationof/x/. It occurs, for instance, in forms of the verb xzy I to see where the/x/ is adjacent to
the voiced consonant/z/, e.g. [V]zyato see (compare kxzehe sees). In such cases it
is normally non-phonemic, but there is one case where the sound has become
phonemicized: d I to reap. Originally *xd (
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
44/390
21
1.3.6 Laryngeals and pharyngeals:,h,The laryngeal stop/ewrya Hebrew, >lya upper (Syr. >ely exalted,
upper),>eddnatime. There are a few words where Syriac influence is not the cause,
but rather the influence of a/q/or emphatic in the word, e.g.>aqerwascorpion, >amqa
deep and >umathigh. This is not a consistent rule, for instance />/ is lost in uqb
E
r).14
Most commonly />/ is found in Arabic loanwords. Some examples are: >amma
uncle, >aqra farmland, >ya to live and jm>a to gather together. In some other
Arabic loanwords/>/has been weakened to a /
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
45/390
22
As mentioned above, original *// is usually realized as a velar fricative /x/ in
ANA. Some cases of the original pharyngeal// do survive: in religious words, e.g. mia
Christ, maepa altar and aya sinner, and in the vicinity of /q/, e.g. raqa
far.
15
This sound has also emerged as an innovation in the 3sg. pronominal suffixes, -e
and -a, which were originally *-ehand *-ah. As will be discussed in 5.2, the cause of
this change may have been a need to distinguish clearly between these suffixes and the
noun inflections -a(sg.) and -e (pl.).
The phonemic distinction between // and /x/ is demonstrated in the following
minimal pairs:
-x baher house bax your (fs.) house
li my condition xlimy maternal uncle
ennehe relented xenneothers
There is also a minimal pair for/h/and//:
h- maboheto liken maboeto praise
1.3.7 Emphatics:, , ,, , r, ,p,(m),(l)ANA has inherited the two emphatic consonants of Syriac, //and//, distinguished from
their non-emphatic counterparts in the following minimal pairs:
t- p-ta in the year pato extend (ones arm)
s- sw
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
46/390
23
[bela]16
onion (A). The original emphatic in such cases may be called the primary
emphatic, in this case//. Similar to this is the emphaticization that occurs among certain
combinations of consonants that were not historically emphatic, as in pesra [pera]
meat (A) (compare Syr. besr). Emphatic spread is a feature common in NENA, as alsoin dialects of Arabic. Although some patterns of emphatic spread are shared, the extent
and nature of the feature varies from dialect to dialect. In the Jewish dialects of Iranian
Azerbaijan, for instance, emphasis spreads throughout the entire word and vocabulary
can be divided into plain (non-emphatic) and flat (emphatic) words.17
In ANA
emphasis often affects only part of the word, e.g.pxaletta[pxaletta] youll (m.) finish
it (f.) (A), although some words may be pronounced entirely emphatic, e.g. marira
[marira] (marira [marira]) bitter (A) and bela[bela] onion (A). The patterns of
emphatic spread in ANA will be discussed in more detail in 1.5.6 below.
Emphatic spread does not only produce the historic emphatics of Syriac, and,
or even those of the classical Semitic languages, such as , and , but also r, l, m, b,p,
n, , andf. Emphatic spread is by its nature conditioned and therefore non-phonemic,
but some of these sounds have become phonemicized. For instance there are several
minimal pairs available for the/r/-/r/contrast:
r-r mra master mra shovel
bra well bra light
xyra to look xyra cucumber
mira said (ms.) mira prince
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
47/390
24
stop // is rare; it is presumably merged with // in the Arabic dialects from which the
loanwords come.18
In fact the only unconditioned occurrence of it is in the loanword/ which has since been lost.
This appears to be behind the emphasis inamr) which is not found
in
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
48/390
25
slightly different origin revealed by the cognate Class II21
verb yII to hide (tr.). In the
Class I verb, // and // have coalesced to // []. The infinitive was therefore *ya.
Because this has only two radicals, another was introduced. The consonant /h/ was
perhaps chosen by analogy with a verb of similar form, hyato be tired.22
This phoneme is quite rare cross-dialectally. It is not attested, for instance, in the
dialects of Qaraqosh and Mangesh. It is however reasonably well attested in Aradhin23
and is also found in the dialect of Jilu.24It also occurs in the Assyrian Koine, though only
as part of whole-word emphasis.25
An even rarer phoneme is /p/which only has phonemic status in one loanword:
pyesAutumn (K.payz) and thus should be considered marginal.
The phonemic statuses of [m] and [l] are less certain and marginal at best. These are
all common as allophones of /m/ and /l/ in cases of emphatic spread. The word mma
Mummy cannot be explained in this way but is perhaps a special case, being child
language. In lappahandful (K. lep) the emphatic lateral could be explained by emphatic
spread from an emphatic/p/, which is established as a phoneme. But the phonemic status
of /p/ is itself so marginal that the emphatic spread might have easily occurred in the
opposite direction. In fact, as the word is foreign, it cannot be assumed that it is following
normal ANA rules at all.26
21Verbal classes are equivalent to Syriac conjugations (Peal, Pael etc.) (6.1).
22See Krotkoff (1982: 14) for a discussion of the derivation of and in the Aradhin dialect. He cites lp
to split, from Syr. lp, and y>. Also see Mutzafi (2000: 302-3) for a
discussion of the emergence of in the dialect of Maha Khtaya d-Baz.23
Krotkoff (1982: glossary) lists fifteen lexemes beginning with this consonant.24
Fox (1997: 13). Also see the glossary.25
Odisho (1988: 49-50).26
It is interesting to note that the source word in Kurdish is not emphatic. This case is reminiscent of the
practice in Arabic of pronouncing some consonants in non-Semitic loanwords as emphatic, e.g. wula
table (Italian tavola),la hall (Italian sala) and umatomato.
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
49/390
26
1.4 Phonetic realizationThe phonetic realization of consonants is greatly complicated when assimilation is taken
into account. Because a great deal of assimilation is not indicated in the transcription, a
writing of one phoneme may actually represent the sound of another. For instance, the b
in bla to boil is realized as [p], a separate phoneme in ANA. For the sake of
simplicity such realizations will not be covered in this section. Instead this issue will be
dealt with separately in 1.5.
1.4.1 General issuesBefore going on to describe the phonetic realizations of each consonant phoneme, it is
worth outlining some of the issues which affect consonants generally.
1.4.1.1 AspirationIn ANA stops, whether voiced, voiceless, emphatic or non-emphatic, are all unaspirated.
This is also the situation found in the dialect of Mangesh, but not in all NENA dialects.27
In some dialects aspiration exists as a conditioned variant, while in others it is in
phonemic contrast with non-aspiration, as it is in the Kurmanji dialect of Kurdish.28
1.4.1.2 FricativizationAs mentioned, in earlier Aramaic certain consonants were pronounced as fricatives in
post-vocalic position. A similar phenomenon occurs in the modern dialect, though it is
much less widespread or consistent. Thus in intervocalic position /b/, /p/ and /d/ are
sometimes pronounced as fricatives, e.g. bbi [bB i ] my father (A:115).29 It is also
27Sara (1974: 35). In the dialect of Qaraqosh voiceless stops are pronounced with slight aspiration in most
environments (Khan 2002: 27).28
For a discussion of aspiration in NENA dialects see Tosco (2002: 737-754). For an outline of the
phonology of two Kurmanji dialects with an aspirated-unaspirated distinction, cf. Blau (1975: 21-32).29
Intervocalic or postvocalic fricativization is attested in other languages such as Spanish and is explained
as a kind of assimilation. Fricatives are closer to vowels than stops are, as they allow some air-flow.
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
50/390
27
attested with the emphatic allophone of/b/: r[B]abig (A).Fricativization is also found
in other dialects such as Qaraqosh (/b/and/d/) and Arbel (/b/,/p/and/q/).30
1.4.1.3 DevoicingVoiced phonemes occurring in final position are normally devoiced, e.g. mjweb!
[mdZup] answer! (A) and qapa [qApx] lid (A). In some cases the devoicing has
become phonemicized, that is, it is still found even in non-final position. This is the case
withpyesAutumn (Kurmanjipayiz).
pye[s]-ile it is Autumn (A)
This example may be compared with the following showing non-phonemic voicing:
mjwe[p] answer! mjawo[b]eto answer,mjuwe[b]liI answered (A)
be[t] hell reap [d]ato reap, e[d]lthey reaped (A)
qapa[x] lid qapa[V]ed-destiasaucepan lid (A)
bada[t] Baghdad bada[d]-ilait is Baghdad (A)
The loanword mz [ms] table (K. mz) seems to be in a state of flux, as the [z] is
sometimes restored and sometime not. It will therefore be considered as having two
variants: mzand ms.
mz-ile ms-ile it is a table (A)
In the case ofyapra[x]dolma the final consonant is not restored but the original voicing
is still preserved in the plural form:
yapra[x]ed-yemmimy mothers dolma (A)
yapr[V]edolmas (A)
30Khan (2002: 26; 1999: 17-18, 25-26).
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
51/390
28
1.4.1.4 GeminationDoubled consonants are distinguished from single consonants by a longer duration before
release, as in Arabic and Italian:
keba[kYb]she wants (A) lebba[lYb]heart (A)
This duration is sometimes shorter in unstressed syllables, e.g. dekkany[ d e 2k.nE6i]their
shopsand bassemta [ b s . e 2mt1]nice (f.).
1.4.2 Phonetic realization of consonant phonemes1.4.2.1 Labials:p,b,f,v,w,m/p/ is usually realized as an voiceless unaspirated bilabial stop, [p]. Between vowels, /p/
may be pronounced as a bilabial fricative [F], e.g. bil[F]a learning (B).
/b/ is usually realized as a voiced bilabial stop, [b]. Like /p/ it may be fricativized in
intervocalic position, e.g. tett-a[B]a two weeks (A:31) and l[B]i (A:228) l[b]i
(A:227) I cant. This fricativization also occurs over word-boundaries, e.g. x-ivna
[B]ixlaa shepherd eating (A:161).
/f/ is realized as an voiceless labio-dental fricative, [f].
/v/ is realized as a voiced labio-dental fricative, [v].
/w/ is realized as a labio-velar approximant, [w].
/m/is realized as a bilabial nasal stop, [m].
1.4.2.2 Dentals, alveolars, post-alveolars: t, d, , , s,z, ,, n, l, r/t/ is realized as a voiceless unaspirated dental stop, [t1].
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
52/390
29
/d/ is usually realized as a voiced dental stop, [d1]. In intervocalic position a fricative
allophone [D] is occasionally found, e.g. yarx-le hdax [Dx] thus (A:40) and
mder[mSDr]send! (A).
//is realized as an voiceless interdental fricative, [T].
//is realized as a voiced interdental fricative, [D].
/s/ is realized as an voiceless alveolar fricative, [s].
/z/ is realized as a voiced alveolar fricative, [z].
// is realized as an voiceless post-alveolar fricative, [S]. It is articulated with some lip-
rounding.
//is realized as a voiced post-alveolar fricative, [Z].
/n/ is usually realized as a dental nasal, [n1], e.g. [n1]ra river (A). It frequently
assimilates, however, to the articulatory position of a following consonant. Before a
bilabial it is therefore often realized as [m], e.g. wo[m]bixlaIm eating (A), kbe[m]
paxtiI want my piece of bread (A:166); before velars as [N], e.g. da[N]k mill-stone
(A) and kbe[N]ktwiI want my splinter (A:157).
/l/ is realized as a voiced dental31lateral approximant [l1].
/r/ is realized, in most positions, as a moderately retroflex, often lateral,32 alveolar flap,
[] [].33 The lateral realization is similar in sound to the retroflexed lateral flap in
31Or possibly alveolar.
32I.e. there is airflow either side of the tongue and the sound has an l-quality.
33These symbols represent the alveolar lateral flap (there is no way of marking this as retroflex) and the
retroflex alveolar flap respectively. Thanks are due to H. Mutzafi for first identifying the Alqosh /r/ as
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
53/390
30
Pashto.34
Sometimes there is no contact between the tongue and the roof of the mouth
and the /r/ is realized as a retroflex alveolar approximant []. Very occasionally /r/ is
realized as a trill with two taps. The presence of /r/ affects its environment: preceding
vowels are rhoticized, that is they take on some of the acoustic properties of a rhotic.This is similar to the situation in American English where vowels preceding an rhave a
rhotic quality.35
According to Ladefoged and Maddieson (1996: 216) this is one of the
cross-linguistic tendencies of the rhotic family. Examples: ra[tu]mountain (A),
p-tanra [ptnu] into the oven (A:44),
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
54/390
31
1.4.2.4 Palatal:y/y/ is in most cases realized as a voiced palatal approximant [j]. Between two open
vowels, it is not usually as close as an approximant, but rather a high vowel such as [e],
e.g. betya-u [bSt1eEu]drinking and (A:169).
1.4.2.5 Velars and uvulars:k,g,x,,q/k/ is pronounced as an voiceless unaspirated velar stop, [k], articulated slightly further
forward than the British English/k/. If/k/ precedes/t/ or/p/, it may be pronounced with a
double articulation, that is the/k/is released at the same time as the following consonant,
e.g. kpaxen[kpTxn]I open (B).
/g/ is realized as a voiced velar stop, [g], e.g. gre[gu]men (A). If/g/precedes/d/
or /b/, it may be pronounced with double articulation, e.g. gdlatta? [gdlEtt.] can
you see it (f.)? (A) and gbasqila[gbsqil]they sow it (f.) (B).
/x/ is articulated between between the velar and uvular positions. The furthest forward is
around the position of the English kin card, not as far forward as the English kin keen;
the furthest back is nearly but not quite as far back as uvular [X].
/q/ is realized as an voiceless uvular stop [q], though not quite as far back as the classical
Arabic/q/.
1.4.2.6 Laryngeals and pharyngeals:,/
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
55/390
32
In place of a true stop, a very compressed form of creaky voice or some less extreme
form of stiff phonation may be superimposed on the vocalic stream.36
/h/is realized as an voiceless laryngeal fricative [h].
The laryngeals are often elided before or after a consonant (
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
56/390
33
typically made in the epiglottal region, noting however the conclusions of Boff Dkhissi
(1983) that the movement of the epiglottis is not independent from that of the root of the
tongue; rather the two elements work together in forming the constriction. More
appropriate IPA symbols for these sounds might therefore be []and [], which representepiglottal fricatives (there are no symbols for epiglottal or pharyngeal approximants). But
as the exact articulation of the Neo-Aramaic sounds has not been measured, the
conventional symbols for the Arabic sounds, [?]and [], will be used.
The />/of ANA, though similar to the Arabic sound, usually sounds weaker and
occasionally is hardly distinct from/
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
57/390
34
kpaxtta(mata] baptism (A)
sedta [setta] closed (fs.) (A)
kyaqi [kyaGi] they burn (A)
xred +xena [xretxna] friends of the groom (B)
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
58/390
35
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
59/390
36
Nasal assimilation is not attested in the opposite direction; that is, nasality is not lost
before a non-nasal consonant. For instance, the /m/in m-brafrom the side (A) is not
realized as [b] and the/n/in sandapot (A) is not realized as [d].
1.5.3 Assimilation to a fricativeOccasionally a stop assimilates to a following fricative. This occurs when the two are
found at the same or nearest point of articulation. The types attested are as follows:
(i) ktox
l-xxaxen(
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
60/390
37
1.5.5 Assimilation of the place of articulationOccasionally a consonant assimilates to the place of articulation of the following
consonant. This form of assimilation only occurs in certain cases. One case is /n/ before
the voiceless bilabial /p/ (/n/ before /b/ is not attested). This occurs with forms of the
verbs npl to fall and npq to go out:
[m]pltafallen (f.) (C:1) (compare bednpelhe will fall (A))
ma[m]plebringing down (D) (compare maneplashell bring down (A))
[m]pqlehe left (D:5) (compare mnpeqhell leave (A))
It also occurs over word boundaries:
kben [kbem]paxtiI want my piece of bread (A:166)
This type of assimilation also occurs to the//k-//verbal prefix before/q/:
l-qqleb (< l-k-+ qleb) it (m.) does not turn (D)
Assimilation of the place of articulation also occurs in combination with other kinds of
assimilation (cf. 1.5.7).
1.5.6 Emphatic spreadEmphatic spread is strictly speaking the spread of emphasis from a primary emphatic (i.e.
one that was historically emphatic) to surrounding consonants. This is found in words
such as pla [pla] (Syr. pl) to go out. There is also non-original emphasis, where
there was no emphasis historically but where the occurrence or combination of certain
consonants has tended to lead to the appearance of emphasis. For example combinations
of labials and/r/ frequently become emphatic, e.g. marira [marira] bitter (Syr. marrr)
and barya[barya]outer (Syr. barry). Non-original emphatics can trigger emphatic
spread just like original emphatics. Non-original emphasis is less predictable than
emphatic spread, although some tendencies can be observed.
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
61/390
38
Not all consonants may be pronounced with emphasis. The emphatic phonemes
are , , ,, , r, andp. In addition there are emphatic sounds that occur as allophones:
[m], [l], [b], [n], [f] and []. Of these the first two have uncertain phonemic status.
The patterns of emphatic spread that are found in ANA are described below. Inthe examples the primary (historic) emphatics are marked in bold.
(i) Emphasis consistently spreads to an immediately adjacent consonant if that consonant
may be emphatic. This assimilation occurs both backwards and forwards:
Backwards assimilation Forwards assimilation
[m]yato ripen (A) xamua(*xam-Ta) sour (f.) (A)
[b]eafnenI will be pensive (A) be[l]aonion (A)
pxa[l]ettayoull finish it (f.) (A) me[r]arain (A)
(ii) Emphasis also spreads to neighbouring consonants when they are separated by a
vowel. Backwards spread is the type most consistently found, but forwards spread is also
common. Emphasis may only spread over one syllable or it may spread further, e.g.
[m][pl]e[l]etake (sg.) it (m.) out!
Backwards assimilation Forwards assimilation[m]ulisten (pl.)! (A) pqaeyou will cut it (m.) off (A:207)42
[pal]iwacame out (A:65) qa[ll]ekill him! (A)
[pl]agone out (f.) (A:128) [m]a(B)
[b]elaonion (A) e[m]ytheir taste (B)
[m]erarain (A) ra (ra) mountain (A)
[n]oraguard (A)
k[m]ehe reaches (A)
k[f]erhe breakfasts(A)
[l]-wenot good (pl.) (B)
42But compare betxaletteyou (m.) will finish it (m.) (A) andpxalettayoull (m.) finish it (f.) (A).
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
62/390
39
The distribution of non-original emphasis is less predictable. In most cases, there is a
rhotic present, but there are many words with rhotics that are not emphatic. In some cases
there was historically an/>/that has been lost (cf. 1.3.7).
[bera] threshing floor (A)
[pera] meat (A)
[)
1.5.7 Combinations of assimilatory processesWhere more than one assimilatory force is active, they will have a combined effect on theconsonant. The morpheme //d//, whether in its genitival (10.2.1), relativizing (10.4.1)
or complementizing (10.4.3) functions,assimilates consistently in voicing and emphasis
to a following consonant, according to the rules outlined above, e.g. l-qemme-ra(
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
63/390
40
// risqte-alye rosary beads (lit. beads of praying) (A:147)
// -le(
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
64/390
41
kben -aqlen I want to take (A:209) as [kebenaqlen], qmen zzli Let me rise to go
(A) as [qmenzli] and kben z-zli I want to go (A:199) as [kbenzli].
1.6 Questions of transcription1.6.1 Showing assimilationAssimilation blurs the distinctions of what is and is not phonemic. In a phonemic
transcription this creates a problem. When assimilation takes place, do we represent the
assimilated consonant more phonetically or as an archiphoneme, leaving the reader to
apply the assimilation rules? In the first method we would write [reta] New Year
as re-ta, in the second, red-ta(or reD-ta). In fact there are various factors
that must be considered and to apply one method to the exclusion of the other would
create more problems than it solves. The problem is therefore where to draw the line.
From a linguistic point of view it is mostly arbitrary, so the main issue is what is most
suitable for the function the transcription serves.
The purpose of the transcription here is to provide a faithful and efficient
representation of speech. A transcription that hides assimilation reveals the underlying
morphology more clearly but is more removed from actual utterance; for instance the
suffix -edmight represent any one of the following: [ed], [et], [e], [es], [e], [ez], [e], ifnot others. To write -edwould help the reader, by acknowledging that these are all only
surface manifestations of the same morpheme. But this help is not required for a hearer to
understand, so there is no reason why it should be necessary for a reader. Furthermore a
more phonetic transcription makes certain phonetic processes such as elision more easy
to understand. For instance, if we write the verbal prefix//b//as mbefore another/m/, e.g.
mmanepla shell bring down, we can see why this prefix is so easily elided (i.e.
manepla). Likewise if we can see that//d//is often fully assimilated to a following//, as
in ree-ta, its elision in other cases (i.e. [reta])is more understandable than if we
wrote it as red-tain all cases.
An issue that is particularly relevant to the transcription of speech is variation.
Natural speech tends to show more variation than literary or standard languages. Where
there is a great deal of variation, a more morphological transcription can simplify and
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
65/390
42
make the meaning clearer to the eye, but is less helpful in representing the true condition
of a natural spoken language. The reader is also unable to ascertain the relative
commonness of the variants which might suggest whether or not a change is in process.
Because of these factors, the transcription used here to represent ANA tends toshow assimilation. The exceptions to this principle are as follows:
(i) Non-phonemes
Assimilation that results in consonants without phonemic status, such as [n], is not
shown. This also applies to the marginal phonemes (, , p) anduncertain phonemes (m,
l). So, for example, qa[ll]ekill him! (A) is written as qalle, thoughpqa[]eyou will
cut it (m.) off (A:207) is written aspqa
e.
(ii) Root consonants
In derived forms, for instance all verbal forms and feminines of nouns, root consonants
are shown without assimilation. This is only done when cognate forms without the
assimilation can show what the basic phoneme is. For instance kale[p]a bitch is
written as kalebabecause the plural is kale[b]yabut qale[p]aflake of dandruff is
written as qalepabecause it is a derivative of qalpapeel. Likewise [p]xyato weepis written as bxyabecause the underlying consonant is revealed as/b/in forms such as
l-bxetdont weep! The same rule applies even to loanwords which strictly speaking
do not conform to the Semitic triradical system, e.g. pla[f]ta shoe written as plavta
because of the pluralplve.Other examples are below:
[]zyato see, written asxzya(compare kxzehe sees)
[k]xkato laugh, written as gxka(compare ggxekhe laughs)
[m]pellehe fell, written as npelle(compare bednpelhe will fall)>ma[]tabaptism, written as >mata(compare >mato baptize)
ge[t]aaccident, written as geda(cognate with gdeleit happened)
a[p]aweek, written asaba (pl. aba)
ra[p]abig (fs.), written as raba (ms.rba)
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
66/390
43
Assimilation of the root is however marked where it is a type of assimilation that is
restricted in its application, such as the assimilation of a rhotic to /t/ in the feminine
adjectives qaretta cold (m. qarira)and maretta bitter (m. marira marira). This is
because this assimilation is not universal (compare
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
67/390
44
The same aid is not necessary for the b-infinitive construction (e.g. mmaploxe using), as
the preposition m- rarely occurs before an infinitive and would in any case be
distinguished by the hyphen (m-maploxefrom using).
(iii) Emphatic spread
Emphatic spread, other than to grammatical morphemes, is not indicated in order to
minimize the number of diacritics marks. Only the primary emphatic is written. Thus, for
instance, [bela] onion (Syr. bel)is written as bela. The spread of the emphasis is not
entirely predictable, not least because of the degree of variation that is found.
Nevertheless the distribution of secondary emphasis is not phonemic and so there is no
vital need to represent it.Emphatic spread in verbal roots is shown when the consonants are fully phonemic
and the emphasis is found in all forms of the verb, e.g. nrto guard (nruxmay he
protect you (A), nwrehe guarded (A), naoraguard (A) etc.).
Where there is non-original emphasis, in most cases there is a rhotic present. To
keep diacritic marks to a minimum, it is therefore most efficient to mark the rhotic as
emphatic and let the reader apply the rules of emphatic spread. Thus [bera] threshing
floor is written as bedraand [xamra] wine asxamra. There are a few exceptional cases
which must be considered.Rhotics are also not present in [la] and [ella] three (m.
and f. respectively), but as is a full phoneme and not l, we will only mark the as
emphatic. Likewise for [loni] swallow (Syr. s#nnit), to be written as loni.We also
find /b/ being realized as an emphatic in the vicinity of // but as emphatic b is not a
phoneme, this will not be marked.
(iv) Sandhi
Assimilation over word boundaries (sandhi) will notbe shown. Thus
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
68/390
45
(
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
69/390
46
Stop Fricative
b b w
g g duka place.
In some cases the monophthongization of *e, *aand *oto //and/o/has left
the//-Ta//suffix in post-vocalic position:
*qarrit*qareta *qarewta qarta near (f.)
Elision of/
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
70/390
47
1.7.1.2 Dissimilation in nounsThere are sporadic cases of an original * or * being realized as a stop in the
neighbourhood of another dental fricative, e.g. *
spadia cushion. The same process can be seen in the dialect of Qaraqosh.49
1.7.1.3 Analogy in verbal rootsIn verbal forms the allophonic distribution of beakea consonants has broken down
under the influence of analogy. For any given verbal root the realizations of the radicals,
whether stop or fricative, have been fixed for all forms within a single class. Thus we
have the // (
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
71/390
48
It also occurred with the Pael present base:
Syr. ANA
mzabbn mzben let him sell
Gemination was retained in mayyasky, heaven (Syr. mayy) and rabbanmonk (Syr.
rabbanour master) perhaps because words used in the church are often preserved in an
archaic form.
Gemination was not lost when preceded by an /e/(CeCC). The gemination was
preserved and the vowel left short:
Syr. ANA
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
72/390
49
This has also occurred in certain Class II verbal forms: the infinitive, the past base, and
the feminine stative participle:
Earlier stage ANA
*mzabbone mzabone to sell
*mzubbenni mzubenni I sold
*mzubbanta mzubanta sold (f.)
There are a few exceptions to this rule: dukkneplaces (sg. dka, Syr.dukk), bassima
nice (Syr. bassm), gabbrachampion (Syr. gabbr).
1.7.2.3 In verba tertiae /r/In forms of verba tertiae /r/ or/r/, the rhotic merges with L-set suffixes. Originally this
resulted in gemination, as is still found in other dialects, but in ANA the gemination has
been lost and any preceding short vowel is lengthened in compensation, e.g. *twerre >
twre he broke.50See 6.3.5 and 6.18.1.1 for details.
1.7.3 Elision of consonants1.7.3.1 Loss of/
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
73/390
50
In verb forms elision of the laryngeals is sometimes morphologically conditioned.
Compare mli (
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
74/390
51
CHAPTER TWO
VOWELS
2.1 Phoneme inventoryThere are nine vowel phonemes, six of them long and three short. The distinction
between long and short is only phonemic in certain environments, as will be discussed
below. The phonemes/o/,//, and/i/are usually realised as long but not marked as suchin order to minimize the number of diacritics.
/i/ // // // /o/ //
/e/ /a/ /u/
2.2 Phonology of vowel qualityThe following tables contain minimal pairs showing phonemic distinctions, firstly among
the long vowels and then among the short vowels. The question of phonemic length is
dealt with in 2.3.
2.2.1 Long vowelsThe following table follows the order given above, pairing each vowel in turn with the
remaining vowels.
i-
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
75/390
52
- xzla she saw xzla see (fs.) her!
wwa he was wwa they were
- wwa he was wwa she was
-o xzla she saw xzola see (pl.) her!- nra river nra fire
- wwa they were wwa she was
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
76/390
53
2.3 Phonology of vowel lengthDistinction of vowel length in ANA is phonemic but only in certain environments. In
many other cases length is predictable. Most notable is the rule that long vowels, except
for/o/, // and a few exceptional cases of//,do not normally occur in closed syllables.
The distribution of short and long vowels is also limited by historical accident. Because
of this complexity there are only three minimal pairs available for vowel length, and only
for a-
a- mara illness mra master
dara step dra century
qaa let her cut qa tomcat
Nevertheless the other distinctions,/e/-//and/u/-//, can also be said to be phonemic. In
certain types of open syllables both the long and the short vowels may occur, being
restricted only by historical or morphological factors, not phonetic ones. Therefore
minimal pairs contrasting length are theoretically possible within the phonological system
of ANA. The following are near-minimal pairs showing unconditioned length distinction:
e- keba she wants kpa stone
u- duu trample (pl.)! da honey
puqa frog qa market
2.3.1 Distribution of vowel lengthAs stated, length is not contrastive in every position. The rules for the distribution of long
and short vowels are conditional on three factors:
i. whether the syllable isnon-finalorfinalii. whether the syllable isopenorclosediii. where the syllable is in relation to thestress(which is usually penultimate)
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
77/390
54
Although length is non-phonemic in some environments, it will nevertheless be marked
in all environments in order that the transcription system may show simple one-to-one
correspondances between symbol and sound.1
Final syllables behave in a markedly different manner to other syllables. Firstlynon-final syllables will be discussed, and then final syllables.
2.3.1.1 Non-final syllables2.3.1.1.1 Closed syllables (-CvCC-)In non-final closed syllables only short vowels (/a/,/e/,/u/)are regularly found, with the
exception of /o/ and //, though those also tend to contract to /a/ (2.3.2.1). Other long
vowels are only rarely found: in the loanword rdyu radio and as a variant of /a
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
78/390
55
imperatives of verba mediae /y/ and/w/, e.g. qumuget up! (qym)andzunubuy!
(zwn).2These short vowels seem to be contractions from original long vowels which
are still found in other dialects (e.g. Aradhin qu:mu stand!, dwu:qu seize! and
Tkhuma qmustand up!, (w)oquleave!).3
Other short vowels are usually explainedby the historical loss of a consonant which has opened a previously closed syllable (cf.
2.5.6.3). A few are found in loanwords, e.g. tutun tobacco and tanaga tin (cf.
2.5.6.6).
The following examples show cases of all the vowels in this position and near-
minimal pairs between short and long vowels of the same or similar quality:
e-i ma taste ma value
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
79/390
56
Long vowels Short vowels
/i/ b-ida in the hands /e/ bedmer he will say
// kbye (a type of dish) kebnna I want her
bra wells mmaemli shell make// xwa she used to sew me hear
// pxwa he used to open /a/ paxta piece of
nra guard pitta bread
klkke crocheted shoes kawa writer
/o/
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
80/390
57
Long vowels Short vowels
/i/
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
81/390
58
A short/e/is found in the following verb-form:
/e/ memla make (pl.) her hear!
This is the plural imperative of a Class III verbum tertiae /
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
82/390
59
pxwloxun) is not a factor. The only relevant fact therefore is whether the syllable is
stressed (tonic) or unstressed.
As in the case of non-final syllables, length is also affected by whether the
syllable is opened or closed.
2.3.1.2.1 Closed syllables (-CvC)(i) Stressed syllables usually have long vowels but may have short vowels.
For most ANA words stress lies on the penultimate syllable. There are however some bi-
or trisyllabic words, mostly of foreign origin, which are stressed on their final syllable,
e.g.zangn rich. There are also many words with only one syllable, e.g. px open!.
Unless such a word is a particle (see 2.3.1.2.1.ii), it normally takes stress and can begrouped with final-stress words. Words with final stress are found in many different
categories including imperatives, pseudo-verbs, question words, adverbs, numbers,
pronouns, adjectives and a few foreign nouns. Unlike other closed syllables final-stressed
syllables are almost always, but not exclusively, long. Examples are px open!,
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
83/390
60
2.3.1.2.2 Open syllables (-Cv)(i) Stressed syllables apparently only have long vowels.
There are too few final open syllables that are stressed to formulate firm rules, but only
long vowels are attested, e.g. s! go (ms.)!,
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
84/390
61
open (ms.) ispxtaand the feminine ofzrasmall iszrta. We will also show that in
some cases a final short u in an open or closed syllable is cognate with o.
The precise nature of the relationships between the short and long vowels is best
described through the processes that exhibit them: syllable closure, lengthening andshortening due to changes in stress position, and discourse lengthening. Finally in
2.3.2.4 the special case of final unstressed uand uCwill be considered.
2.3.2.1 Syllable ClosureThere are many cases where the addition of a morphological suffix results in the closure
of an open syllable. In such cases, where the vowel was initially long, it is usually
shortened. For instance the feminine of the adjective rbabig takes -aas an ending (inplace of -a), creating a closed syllable and short vowel: raba. If the long vowel is i, then
the contracted vowel is e. For each long vowel, there is a short vowel equivalent.
Two vowels which are sometimes resistant to shortening are oand . When they
do shorten, it is normally to a.4Both are in most cases reflexes of original diphthongs,
*awand *ay, but o is sometimes original, as in imperative forms such as pox! open!
(Syr.pt). Shortening to aoccurs to both historical */aw/and historical *//.
There are only two examples of syllable closure for//. One is telkpeTelkepe -
telkepnya man of Telkepe. The other is less expected: meskna poor (ms.) -
meskyanta poor (fs.).
The relationship between the long vowels and their equivalents in closed syllables
is represented in the following table:
Long i o
Short a e u (e,ya) ao a
4Contraction of/o/to/a/in a closed syllable also occurs regularly in the dialect of Tisqoopa (Rubba 1993:
278; 284). It is also attested in feminine infinitives of Classes II and III in the dialects of Mangesh and
Aradhin, e.g. Mangesh mpaloi to expel, mpalata a single expulsion (Sara 1974: 75) and Aradhin
mxawo:re to associate, mxawarta an association (Krotkoff 1982: 24-5) . It is not clear whether it occurs
in other cases in these dialects. Contraction of /o/ to /a/is also attested in the Central Aramaic dialect of
uroyo (Jastrow 1993: 239).
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
85/390
62
Below are examples of syllable closure. Most cases involve one of the following suffixes:
the feminine suffix (//-Ta//), the plural endings -waand -ya,or verbal affixes.
a pxato open (m.) paxtaopening (fs.)
rbabig (ms.) rababig (fs.)
mavillage mawavillages
kpexhe opens kpaxashe opens
i e yarixalong (ms.) yarextalong (fs.)
pixliI opened it (f.) pexliI opened
amuqtadeep (fs.)
tara>zewhite cucumbers tara>uztawhite cucumber
amoqta
(fs.) deep (Khan 2002: 216).
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
86/390
63
o u
-
8/12/2019 CompletePhD Coghill
87/390
64
rbban+ -e rabbne monks
bnas+ -i bansi my fault
bna+ -an binan between us
krwan+ -an kar